Thing 12: Social Media Sites

I shared an article from the New York Times, SteamPunk Movement Moves Between Two Worlds with Mixx.

While I was playing around with Mixx, I searched with the key word "books" and out of the top ten results two were about girl's taking off their clothes and one involved "sexy bikini photos." This illustrates my biggest doubt about these sites. If everybody is voting on the best articles, videos, etc. they may appeal to only the lowest common denominator. That sounds so very snobby, but right now I can't think of a better way to put it. Maybe I'm missing the point, but after looking quickly at Mixx, Reddit, Digg and Newsvine it looks to me like a lot of the news is frivolous and sensational, and I don't know how those sites would fit in to my library work life. Thumbs down!

Thing 10: Wikis!

I made an addition to the 23 Things Wiki with no trouble, once I realized that multitype was a password and not a link I was supposed to click on (ahem...hangs head in shame). This was caused by jumping in and not reading the directions closely enough combined with working on 23 Things at the desk.

I also found a great link to a Steampunk book list on the Yalsa wiki:

http://wikis.ala.org/yalsa/index.php/Steampunk_and_Neo-Victorian

I like wikis. I think they're fun and useful, but if I was doing serious research on something, I'd have to especially consider the source. The Yalsa wiki is obviously reliable, since it is put together by people from the American Library Association, but you can't always be sure of the authority of contributors to a wiki. I also noticed when I was looking at the sample wikis that there can be problems with vandalism (which would be upsetting) and spam (super sneaky and annoying).

That said, I think it would fun for our librarians to do book list wikis.

Shh!

Shh!
Originally uploaded by Joei Reed

Is this not a cool photo? Steampunk librarian!

I've recently become interested in Steampunk because I read that some librarians have put on Steampunk events for teens. I love fantasy, Victorian things, and dressing up, so it seems like a natural attraction. I'm currently listening to Kenneth Oppel's Airborn to learn more.